


here we are together

by Jerevinan



Series: Ghost Dad AU [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Fatherhood, Fluff and Angst, Ghosts, M/M, Spoilers, ghost dad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-06
Updated: 2017-07-06
Packaged: 2018-11-28 09:22:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11414946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jerevinan/pseuds/Jerevinan
Summary: Ignis wonders how a blind man and a ghost can raise a child together. He doesn't think it's possible, but they manage to do it.[spoilers for all of FFXV]





	here we are together

**Author's Note:**

> Translated to Vietnamese by anidiotpenguin, you can read it [here](https://aliencryingpenguin.wordpress.com/2017/09/08/here-we-are-together/) if you'd prefer

Ignis never expects Aranea to give him a _baby_. 

“A child is an odd gift to give someone, especially a blind man,” he says. “Why don’t you keep him?”

“I don’t want to.”

“Why me?”

“Figured everyone else had their hands full.” Aranea pauses when the baby fusses. After a few minutes of shuffling, the dissatisfied cries wane. “Look, he doesn’t have anyone. There are already so many kids that don’t have homes, and I thought you might be able to help out.”

“Need I remind you I can’t even see him? I have no idea how old he is.”

“He’s a few months old. No more than six.”

“And how did he fall into your care?”

“I was helping some refugees, but some of them have their hands full with their own kids, or kids they’ve taken in. This kid lost his mother to the starscourge, that’s all anyone could tell me. They begged me to take him. So I promised them I’d find him a home.”

The world of ruin orphaned many children. Even Gladiolus and Prompto have adopted two little girls, Aster and Viola. They live in an apartment near the Citadel, in a recovered home with a yard, almost like a normal family.

Ignis is jealous of them, and that might be why he asks to hold him. Why, after doing so, he agrees to the weight of responsibility that is caring for another human being.

It doesn’t feel right, and it doesn’t feel wrong. Ignis holds the infant for only an hour and falls in love with a child whose face he will never see.

“I guess I’ll leave you to it, then,” says Aranea, leaving to go back to helping refugees move into Insomnia, to help with the cleaning effort. To do things Ignis _can’t_. Well, he can, but they won’t _let_ him. He would try to prove to them he is capable, but he has other duties. 

The more he thinks about it, the less sense it makes to have been chosen to become a parent. If there is one matter in which confidence falters, it is fatherhood. 

“You’re doing fine,” says the voice that’s been lingering in every corridor since the night Noctis died.

“The hell I am,” comes Ignis’ short reply. 

“Are we naming him?” asks the most unhelpful, undead husband on Eos.

“What would you name him?”

The ghost pauses for a while, and Ignis continues to stir the formula in the hopes he measured everything out right so that it isn’t too thick or too thin. He can’t wait for the child to be old enough to eat something solid. 

“Victor. ‘Cos this kid wins.”

 _Victor._ It’s a strong name, for a strong child.

“What does he look like, Noct?” asks Ignis quietly. He wants to know. It seems the sort of important thing he ought to know, as a new father.

“His hair is dark. Green eyes. He’s so cute and little. I wish I could hold him.”

“Don’t try.” Ghosts can only drop babies, and Ignis is trying very hard to keep this one alive. “Does he know you’re here?”

“He’s smiling at me right now.” Ignis can hear the delight in Noctis’ voice. “Do you think I should be ‘Dad’ or ‘Papa’ or something else?”

“Something else, since you’re a ghost,” says Ignis. “Why didn’t the Astrals give you a tangible form? Then you could help me.”

Ignis can feel cold arms around him, and it doesn’t feel bad despite that it’s chilly and lonely and he still must do everything himself. It would be nice to have someone to share childrearing duties with, but all they have is an unofficial marriage. Noctis stole wedding rings from a jewelry shop in town and slid them on their fingers, but there wasn’t a ceremony. When Ignis grabbed for Noctis’ hand, he couldn’t even feel the twin of the band he wears. Noctis says it is now as transparent as the rest of him.

Ignis can’t even tell the others what’s going on—they’ll think he has gone mad.

And maybe he has.

~*~

Ignis forgets to put Victor back in his crib and falls asleep together with his son on the sofa. He doesn’t mean to nod off. Victor is teething and fussy, so when he finally rests, Ignis takes the opportunity to shut his eyes. It turns into an hour-long nap.

Noctis uses most of his energy to play poltergeist and takes a picture on Ignis’ camera.

“Who took this?” Prompto asks later, flipping through the photos after he develops them.

“Didn’t you?” asks Ignis, knowing better.

“No way. I’d remember.”

“Cor? Aranea?” Ignis tries a list of unsuitable answers, and falls on, “I was asleep. I don’t remember who was there.”

“Huh. Well, it’s a good shot.” 

Ignis wishes he could see it.

~*~

Victor can toddle around on short legs, clicking buttons on the elevator and giggling in delight when Ignis stops him from taking a ride to unknown locations. Some parts of the Citadel are dangerous, and keeping him on one level is a chore.

“Noctis, do keep a better eye on him,” says Ignis. “If he gets on the elevator, I’ll have no idea which floor he’s visiting.”

“I’m watching him!” There is indignation in the ghost’s voice. “I told you what he was doing, didn’t I?”

Their child is eighteen months old, and he walks too damn fast for Ignis to keep up with him.

“Daddy can’t see, Victor,” he says for the nth time to his son. He manages to scoop the boy into his arms.

Victor puts two filthy hands on Ignis’ face and gives him a sloppy kiss on the cheek.

“Isn’t he cute?” says Noctis.

“He’ll stay cute if we keep him alive.” A blind man and a ghost—what a pair to be raising a child. This might be easier if Victor were older. Some days, Ignis thinks it might’ve been better to have returned the infant to Aranea the moment she handed him over. Now he’s attached. He has gotten Victor through a year, soothing bellyaches and cooling fevers, singing him lullabies and reciting childhood stories as best he can from memory. Gladiolus gave him dozens of audio books, some appropriate for children. He often plays the tapes in the nursery.

They have help with Victor. Whenever Gladiolus and Prompto visit, their daughters play with their cousin. Aster insists Victor is the cutest baby in the universe.

Ignis tries to imagine it, his mind flashing to an unclear mental image of the day he met Noctis. 

His son is half as young as Noctis had been, but he does have a lot of fluffy hair on his head. He imagines Victor is a beautiful child. Everyone else tells him so.

~*~

“Daddy! Papa!” 

Victor runs toward both of them, little feet padding against the smooth tiles of the Citadel corridors where he likes to play.

“Why does he call you so many names?” asks Prompto. “Poor little guy.”

Ignis doesn’t mention that Victor is referring to two different people, and one of them is standing there, not completely visible, but out of Prompto’s consideration and therefore out of sight. 

Everyone asks about the wedding ring he wears, too, but he says it’s a piece of family jewelry he retrieved from his old household that he doesn’t want to lose. He doesn’t mention Noctis.

“Maybe we should tell everyone,” says Ignis to Noctis when everyone else has gone home. Noctis is playing with Victor. One of their son’s favorite games is to chase a toy Noctis hovers through the room. Ignis can’t see it, but the giggling tells him all he needs to know.

Ignis cleans up the other toys the children didn’t put away.

“You should’ve told them from the start,” says Noctis. 

“It’s going to be hard enough explaining it now, even with Victor to back me up.” Not that a child who is barely two could be considered a credible witness. 

“They’ll be more upset you didn’t tell them.”

“If they believe me. How can I tell them I’m married to a ghost?”

“Be glad there aren’t any mental hospitals to lock you up in anymore?”

Ignis throws a plush in the direction of his husband. Noctis yelps, even though the toy surely passes through him.

“Maybe it would be better if you moved on, while Victor has time to forget you. We can tell Prompto and Gladio some story about an invisible friend.” Ignis doesn’t recognize his own voice, cold with reason. 

“Named ‘Papa’?” Noctis sounds like he might cry, but ghosts can’t cry. They’re dead. After a long, sobering pause, Victor begins to fuss. Their moods are affecting him.

“I’m sorry, Victor.” Ignis holds open his arms and apologizes, and Victor comes slamming into him. He lifts the boy up and covers his chubby cheeks in kisses.

“What about me? Aren’t you going to say you’re sorry to me?” asks Noctis, but before Ignis can reply, the room falls quiet. A ghost can pass through walls and make a quick escape in a disagreement.

~*~

“I don’t want you to go,” says Ignis later that night, in the solitude of their bedroom. There is a weight on the bed, but Noctis isn’t lying down. He sits on the corner, close but still too many inches away for Ignis to reach out and feel the cold against his fingertips. “But I don’t want you to be dead anymore.”

Noctis chuckles bitterly. “I wish that, too.”

“Please stay with us.”

“As if I’d leave,” says Noctis.

“Perhaps we should look for a way to bring you back,” says Ignis, and even as he says this, he doesn’t believe in it.

The Astrals have played a cruel joke to have let Noctis’ soul roam Eos. 

“What if I die and move on?” asks Ignis, speaking thoughts he has never shared before but have always lingered in his mind. His voice shakes. “What if I can never be a ghost at your side?”

“Don’t worry about me.” Noctis is unsuccessful at hiding the pain in his voice. “You always worry most about me. And Victor. But we’re happy. We’re together right now.”

“Yes, we are.” Ignis scoots closer and puts his fingers to what he senses is Noctis’ back. The air there is chilling, but the cold has become a comfort over the past few years. 

“I love you, Ignis.”

“I love you, too, Noct.” Which is why everything hurts more than he can bear, but the loneliness he would know otherwise might crush him.

The Astrals have their playthings, and damn Bahamut and the rest for teasing Ignis and Noctis with whatever this is that they have given.

~*~

Ignis holds off telling Gladio and Prompto anything about the ghost in the Citadel. No one ever notices anything unusual. Cor, Iris, Aranea, and Talcott—none of them sees anything strange in the corners of their vision, never witnesses an item move on its own. Noctis teases that he ought to do something drastic, but he refrains. Neither of them can come up with the right approach.

It isn’t until Victor is four that Ignis can no longer hide it.

“But I have two daddies,” Victor insists to Prompto as he draws a picture of his family in crayons. Goodness knows what the boy is drawing—two men and a child, Ignis reckons. His face flushes in embarrassment.

“It’s true,” says Aster. “He’s a ghost.”

Ignis freezes.

Gladiolus responds with a scolding. “That’s not funny, Aster.”

“Daddy, tell them,” says Victor, and the tone of his voice tells Ignis he can’t betray his son on this matter. What kind of father would abandon his child in the truth?

And he doesn’t want to get Aster in trouble, either.

Calmly, Ignis asks, “Can you see him, too, Aster?”

“Uh-huh!” The six year old sounds pleased with herself. “He looks like King Noctis.”

“Aster Amicitia, that’s enough,” says Gladiolus.

“Gladio, please!” Ignis pleads. “Don’t be harsh with her. She’s not…she’s not wrong.”

“Iggy,” says Prompto softly, “that’s not funny.”

Ignis feels the heat in his face. “This would be so much easier if you could see him.”

“You can’t see a thing,” says Gladiolus, and Ignis bites back a retort.

“You know, that’d explain a lot.” Prompto’s voice is eerie and calm. “Vicky’s always talks to someone, and I thought he had an invisible friend—”

“That’s Papa!” Victor sounds defensive, and Ignis reaches over until both his hands rest on his son’s shoulders. He massages them, hoping to calm the poor child.

“You telling me Noct’s a ghost?” asked Gladiolus, snorting.

“A cruel joke the Astrals decided to play on us, I suppose. I hear his voice often, and he…” Touches me, but Ignis decides that might sound too unusual—and perhaps too sensual in front of the children. “He plays with Victor. We argue. We’re…” He uses his thumb to spin his wedding band around his finger. “He’s still dead.”

“He tells us jokes,” says Aster. 

“Can you see him, Viola?” asks Ignis.

The nine-year-old doesn’t answer for a long pause. “Yes,” she confesses after a time. “Don’t be mad.”

“No one’s mad,” says Gladiolus in a soft voice. “C’mere, girls. I’m sorry I snapped at you, Aster.”

“You don’t think I’m…” Ignis doesn’t want to say anything insulting, something that Victor might think applies to him as well. _Crazy. Strange. Broken._

“You wouldn’t joke about this, Iggy.” Gladiolus grunts. “Noctis, you better show your ass.”

There’s a ding, like a pencil hitting glass. 

“A crayon just launched itself at the chandelier,” says Prompto, his voice high pitched from excitement and fright. He often recites events for Ignis’ sake. 

“That was childish.” Gladiolus snorts.

“What do you expect?” snaps Noctis, when two of the people in the room can’t hear him. “You could say something nicer to me after all these years.”

“Well, we haven’t told him all these years,” says Ignis, who doesn’t seem to mind anyone being angry—if only they’d be more upset with _him_ and not Aster or Noctis. “He has a right to be mad.”

“Of course I’m mad,” says Gladiolus, and he sniffs—not from allergies, but the kind that suggest he’s crying. “I carried his…” His swallow is loud, painful, like he can’t get down the lump in his throat. Ignis has one, too, but he doesn’t push it down; he lets it settle at his esophagus and ache. 

Gladiolus doesn’t finish his sentence. There are children present, but he doesn’t need to say it. Ignis knows—he was there when Gladiolus lifted their king from the throne, after Ignis had tried and failed to find a pulse.

“How long have you known?” demands Prompto through his sniffling.

“The same night he died,” admits Ignis. “That’s why I moved into the Citadel. He’s tied to this place, and I didn’t want to leave his side.”

He runs his fingers soothingly through the thick locks of his son’s hair. 

“I’m sorry, Vicky,” says Prompto. “I didn’t realize.”

“It’s okay,” says the boy in a small voice, and no one knows what to say after that. The scratching of crayons on paper has stopped, and Ignis misses the girls’ humming. He wants all the cacophony of children to return to this room, but there is a painful silence that stretches around them instead.

Ignis might not have betrayed his son, but it has come to light that he has been lying to his best friends. He thought it would be more ridiculous if they ever found out, but instead, it only hurts.

~*~

Gladiolus and Prompto quickly forgive Ignis and Noctis. They make up for lost time by hanging around more than usual, and Ignis can’t get a private word in with Noctis.

No one actually minds. The children like to hang out together, despite their age differences, and Ignis feels better as they gradually make Noctis’ presence known to the others.

Iris punches Ignis in the gut for not telling her, but she follows up with a hug. Her response is the one that heals rather than hurts.

~*~

“Noctis, I know what you’re doing. Put those vegetables back on our son’s plate.” Ignis keeps his voice steady and severe.

“But Daddy—”

“Eat,” says Ignis, waving his fork at Victor’s plate. “All of it.”

“How’d he know?” whispers Victor, knowing that no matter how quiet he tries to be, Ignis always hears.

“Dunno, but I tried,” admits Noctis, and there are several taps against the plate as the boiled carrots are returned to it.

Ignis tries not to smile. All children hate one vegetable or another, but his husband and son are the two people who might never outgrow despising them all.

~*~

The first day of school fills Ignis with dread. He has seldom been away from his son for more than a few hours. He personally has met with all the teachers, has seen to it that his son is well prepared, but he doesn’t know what to do as he drops his child off.

It is the one of only a handful of schools in Insomnia that have opened since they started to rebuild the city. It is the same one Noctis attended as a child, which makes Victor all the more excited to go.

Ignis pretends he doesn’t want to walk around the block for four hours with his cell phone clutched in his hands and instead kisses Victor on the forehead in parting.

“I’ll pick you up after school,” he promises. A few minutes later, he climbs into the car next to Cor and lets the marshal drive him away.

The school doesn’t call with an emergency. When Ignis arrives four hours later as promised, Victor is giggling with another student. The teacher reassures Ignis with nothing but praise for Victor. There were minimal tears in the transition. He gets along with the other students. He listens to instructions. 

Ignis wishes Noctis could stand beside him and enjoy this same feeling of pride.

“You’ll have to tell Papa about your day, won’t you?” Ignis herds his son into the backseat and straps him in.

“I can go tomorrow, right?” insists Victor.

“Yes, of course,” says Ignis. He’s a little sad that Victor doesn’t put up more of a fight to stay at home with him.

Children grow up, Ignis gets older, and Noctis…Noctis remains in the Citadel, missing too many pieces of fatherhood.

~*~

There is a shatter in the hallway, and Ignis has no idea what fell and why.

“It’s a light fixture,” says Cor when he’s summoned to assess the damage. He presses a hard foam ball into Ignis’ palm. It’s too soft when thrown on its own, but Ignis is familiar with the toy weapon that it is usually launched from, which offers enough impact to make the ball hazardous. “Found that at the crime scene.”

“Now let’s see if we can find the criminal,” mutters Ignis, who supposes his son must have gone into hiding. “Do you think anyone was injured?”

“I don’t see any blood.”

“That’s hopeful. Please send someone to clean it up.”

Ignis tries the same floor, calling out his son by his full name.

“Victor Caelum Scientia!”

Ignis senses Noctis lingering near the elevator.

“He’s in the library,” says Noctis.

It’s one of the few places Victor thinks Ignis won’t look. The boy knows better than to retreat to somewhere obvious, like his room or the gardens. There are enough alcoves in the library for a seven-year-old to hide.

Ignis travels down to the library and calls out for his son by his full name. 

Victor pads out from behind a bookshelf, his footfalls softened by his socks. 

Ignis holds up the ball. “I know this is yours. I gave it to you. I want the launcher it belongs to, along with all the other balls. You know better than to play inside with it.” He sighs. “Did you mean to hit the light?”

“No.”

His son sounds like he’s telling the truth, and Victor has never displayed a destructive streak before.

“I’m confiscating them for a week. Can you explain to me why what you did was inappropriate?”

“Dad…”

“Victor.” He hates sounding so stern. He didn’t know he had a voice that could be this uncompromising until he became a father. “You could have been hurt or you might have injured someone else. That is unacceptable. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yeah. I’m sorry.” There are tears, and Ignis wants to wipe them all away. But a light fixture is broken and some poor janitor has to clean up the glass.

Victor hands over the toys, two other balls and the launcher. As he leaves, Ignis turns to Noctis and frowns.

“I don’t know how to be the mean dad,” says Noctis helplessly. Well, at least he knows what he’s in trouble for doing—or _not_ doing, in this case.

“A little backup would be nice. Do you think I want to be the disciplinarian?”

“You’re better at it.”

“You haven’t even tried.”

“Maybe I need disciplined, too.” He sounds cheeky.

Ignis hums. “Yes, perhaps. A little non-corporeal punishment, perhaps?”

He can feel Noctis flinch. “C’mon, Specs. That’s the worst pun ever.”

“Blame the Astrals for it,” suggests Ignis, because they truly are at fault for this madness. In fact, he might as well fault them for the pun and the ruined light fixture, too. 

~*~

“This is where Papa died?” Victor’s words echo in the cavernous throne room.

Ignis holds the padlock that shut this room out of their lives for thirteen years, grips it so tight the metal digs into his flesh. He doesn’t need to see it to hate it.

“Yes,” says Ignis, and his voice shakes as much as the rest of him.

Victor is quiet, but his sneakers seem to pound against the marble flooring, up the grand staircase that leads to the…

“Is this the chair?”

“Throne.” Ignis swallows. “Yes.”

A cold hand rests on his back. “I’m right here, Specs.”

 _Not really_ , Ignis wants to reply, but he doesn’t. 

“There’s still a hole in the wall,” says Victor. “Why didn’t anyone fix it?”

“No one wants to come in here.” Ignis’ heartbeat pounds in his ears. He promised his son he would show him, and Noctis agreed it was time, but Ignis isn’t ready. He will never be ready.

“I don’t like it here,” says Victor. “It’s scary.”

“You have a ghost for a father,” says Noctis. “What could you possibly be afraid of at this point?”

“This is the room where you became a ghost.”

Victor’s footsteps hasten past Ignis and Noctis toward the door. Ignis spins around and follows, just as eager to retreat.

~*~

Victor grows into an awkward teenager, and Ignis can tell in the smallest of ways. He hugs less, asks for more video games, and wants to spend most of his time with his friends. Sometimes it makes Ignis ache for the earlier days. It isn’t that Victor resents him, but he misses snuggling with his son. When he tries, Victor protests.

Ignis isn’t the embarrassing father, anyway. He leaves that job for Noctis.

While Victor spends the night with friends, it’s nice having evenings alone with Noctis. Sometimes they stay in bed together. Their hands settle over one another’s, a sensation that’s cold but somehow familiar and soothing to Ignis after all these years.

Ignis still hates the Astrals. They took Noctis away and then only brought half of him back.

But they have time together. Time he wouldn’t have otherwise. They have a son. 

It’s more than Ignis ever thought to ask for.

**Author's Note:**

> Can you believe I wrote this whole thing around the stupid vegetables scene and the non-corporeal joke? Because I fucking did. Where did this angst come from? Why am I emotionally invested in this?
> 
> Side note, but Viola and Aster are daughters for Prompto and Gladio that appeared in a fic I never posted here.
> 
> I am muttering to myself that I have no intention of continuing this, but I know those are all lies. This is a oneshot. For now. Unless something good happens to my brain and I get _ideas_


End file.
